Family no longer seeks kidnapped Calif. teen’s DNA

SAN DIEGO (AP) — The sister of a man suspected of kidnapping a 16-year-old girl and killing her mother and younger brother said she no longer wants paternity tests to determine if the suspect fathered the children.

Lora Robinson said Tuesday she hasn’t asked for DNA to determine if James Lee DiMaggio fathered the children and she doesn’t plan to. Last week, a DiMaggio family spokesman said she wanted DNA of Hannah and Ethan Anderson to give her a sense of closure in her older brother’s death.

Robinson said the request was prompted by rumors that her brother fathered the children but that she doesn’t think a test is needed.

DiMaggio, 40, was killed by FBI agents in the Idaho wilderness Aug. 10 after allegedly killing Christina and Ethan Anderson, whose remains were found in his burned home in Boulevard, 65 miles east of San Diego. Hannah Anderson was rescued and returned safely to California.

The Anderson family said last week that DiMaggio didn’t meet Brett and Christina Anderson until Christina was six months pregnant with Hannah and that Brett Anderson’s DNA was used to identify the remains of 8-year-old Ethan.

Robinson said she had no explanation for her brother’s alleged crimes and that she was “extremely disappointed” in the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department’s investigation.

“They should come back to us and explain what happened,” she said. “They could come forward with evidence — evidence and facts instead of verbally coming out and saying he did it. Where’s the proof?”

Robinson said she was also seeking return of evidence that was seized in the investigation, including letters that Hannah wrote to her brother.

San Diego County Sheriff Bill Gore has called Hannah “a victim in every sense of the word.” He has declined to discuss a possible motive and investigators haven’t publicly addressed other aspects of the case, including why the family went to DiMaggio’s home, how Christina and Ethan Anderson died and how Hannah was treated in captivity.

A spokeswoman for the sheriff’s department, Jan Caldwell, said last week that authorities would not comment on the case because it is an open criminal investigation involving a minor and “for a myriad of legal reasons.”

DiMaggio was born in Germany, where his father served in the Army, and raised in Texas and Southern California. Robinson said her brother left a military career to look after her when their mother died.

DiMaggio was killed 19 years to the day after his father died, Robinson said. Family spokesman Andrew Spanswick has said James Everet DiMaggio committed suicide.

Robinson said she made a pact with her brother.

“We had made a promise to each other that we would stick around for each other, that we would stick around as long as God would allow us,” she said.

Robinson said nothing seemed amiss with her brother when they spoke three days before firefighters found his home burning. When she saw him three weeks earlier, they stayed up late laughing and eating pasta.